The only one for me was the Public House Special. Some cheese, green peppers, pepperoni and thecrust was very thin and I haven't had one for 30 years and I can still smell how good it was andhow different it was.

Is there anyone here that knows how great this pizza was and has been to any current Shakeys thatstill has the same pizza?

I am on a quest to find someplace that has this pizza and the makings and knowledge to be able to still make them.

There was one listed in Montclair, California and the news article said people said it tasted like whenthey were a kid.

Would love to know how and what to be able to make and eat this quality of pizza again.

I have never in the last thirty years had anything that even came close to the memory of aShakey's Public House Special pizza.

My second job was at a Shakeys in 1976 in Everett WA. I was a Pizza Chef there for two years. Later after a stint in the military I was the Assistant Manager at the very same Everett location and also the Lynnwood WA location. All of our dough was made with a bag of spices from Shakeys Corp. and a bag of flour. We never made dough from scratch. The dough was always rolled through the sheeter right away to make skins except for a pound or two that a couple of us would keep to toss skins manually for the throngs of kids that would gather at the window of the kitchen. We never used the hand tossed skins for customers pizza unless they asked for them.

The sauce was made with Tomato Sauce not paste and was mixed with another mysterious bag of goodies from Shakeys.

The cheese was probably the largest difference between Shakeys and other pizzarias. We took large blocks of Mozzarella and cut them into two pound chunks that would fit into the cheese grinder (Hobart brand of course, just like the dough mixer). We would load a block of Mozzarella, then a slice of Provalone, then a chunk of Romano and finally a handfull of Parmesan then started the grinder with a 1/8 inch orifice plate in the end. We just kept adding this alternating series of cheeses until the Mozzarella ran out. I have ground as much as nine bus tubs of cheese at a time.

I can back up the fellow who told you about the Shakeys on Petrovitsky in Renton WA. I got off the phone with them about half an hour ago, my girlfriend should be home with my thin crust Shakeys Special any minute now so I had better go get ready. Oh, there is another Shakeys in Black Diamond Washington and about 30 in the Phillipines too.

See above for cheese types. In 1986 all the Shakeys I have access to changed to pure Mozzarella which was a serious mistake. The Shakeys of today is no where near as good as the pizza of the 70's. I think the cheese change is the reason. It is still the best pizza around, but not what it was.

We used Oberto Pepperoni sliced onsite from large sticks about 1 1/2 inches in diameter. Our Salami was large sticks of Gallo brand hard dry wine slami. The Canadian Brand Bacon was a water added ham product that came in 2 inch diameter sticks sliced in the Hobart slicer. The ground beef was ground from chubs in the "skullery" (back room) and there was a bag of Shakeys beef mix added and mixed in before grinding. We did the same with sausage using Shakeys sausage mix.

Barry, Can you tell us a little bit about the Shakey's sheeter technique. How many times did you run it through? Did you fold the dough between sheetings? How soon after sheeting could you use the skins?

The sheeter was a standard small bakery sheeter. The dough was doubled five or six times until it felt right to the dough roller Jeff who is still my best friend to this day thirty years later. it was run through until it was about 3/32 inch thick for thin crust skins. The skins could be used immediately and had to be used the day that they were made. Several times we had to run a batch of skins on an unexpectedly busy night and used them immediately. Generally we made more Family size skins than we thought we would need because they could be cut down to any size except super saver. If we ran out of those, we could always roll two family size skins through the sheeter just to make one super saver skin. We hardly ever sold any of those. I made one in a Deli once, right after they were introduced, when they still had lots of ingredients. That pizza weighed over ten pounds.

I worked for and owned an Abby's Pizza franchise for many years...I believe this was another spinoff of Shakeys. I had always understood that Shakey's mixed their dough and bulk fermented the dough overnight in the walkin, using the dough the next day to sheet their skins. If Abby's skins were anything similar, the water/flour ratio was between 34 and 37 percent. The dough was extremely stiff and very hard on the mixers..in fact we broke two or three shafts in the eight years I worked for them. As for the skins, the sheeting method can produce fantastic skins but can be very inconsistent. The more you fold and roll the dough, the more tough they become....We roll ours through twice (in my current restaurant). We use the same hydration ratio, bulk ferment at room temperature...sheet the skins to weigh about 20 ounces for a sixteen inch skin, we then stack skins between sheets of wax paper, cool overnight and use the next day. Unfortunately, with so little water in the dough you are at the mercy of your flour...we find some skins let heat pass right through, while others take a long time to cook the toppings...so one has to be constantly vigilant about the changes in flour from lot to lot, and try to adjust with water.

If Shakey's Sacramento was the greatest pizza joint ever created, Abby's in Oregon was a close second especially Lincoln City and my favorite in Florence. I watched the dough man through the glass at the Florence location do the sheeting and knew I would spend the rest of my pizza lifetime duplicating the technique on a small Atlas. I had seen wizard behind the curtain.

sorry for bumping an old thread, but just wanted to say a couple weeks ago we went to the Shakey's in 4 Corners WA.

As a kid I remember going to Shakey's and just loved the place, and was so disappointed when all the ones around me closed down in the 80's.

When I heard there was still a couple left in our state, we made the drive up to 4Corners. It sure wasn't worth it, the building itself was part of a strip mall, so it was nothing like how I remember the chain being as a kid. Inside was so dirty, and so many flies flying around, and I'm not kidding there were bugs flying everywhere.

What I found odd was, if you had missed the sign on the top of the door as you walked in, you wouldn't even know it was a Shakey's you were in. No signs anywhere inside saying 'shakey's or anything. Even the take out boxes were blank, just white cardboard. I thought that was really odd.

The pizza was awful and nothing like I remember, I remember the sauce having a 'spice' almost to it, and being really good and unique. The pizza we had here, was almost grocery store pizza. Sauce was very bland and almost pure tomato taste to it.

I was really sadden by just how bad it was, the bright point was that the mojo potatoes were good. So at least the drive up there wasn't a total lost.

Does anyone know if the other Shake's in Maple Valley WA is any better?

Shakeys was the best pizza I've ever had. I remember when the Hunt brothers bought the chain and proceeded to take it to ground. I'm looking for someone who remembers the exact ingrediants so the pizza can be re-birthed. There was another chain that copied Shakeys, it was called Shotgun Sams and it was virtually the same product. If you have this info. I wopuld be interested to communicate with you. Sincerely, Jim Thykeson

You have it backwards... Shotgun sams was before SHakeys and for a bit was more successfull.

I worked there for 10 years total back then, and the sauce & toppings were plain and not uniquely different from anywhere else... What was unique was the pizza skin and cooking style, never using any product that was greasy (other than sauce) in the usual sense...

As far as shakeys, maybe so, but some of the shakeys were in fact transformed by that particular franchisee into one of the best pizza chains in this Region.

;)Shakey's -Pizza is ALIVE and WEll. Shakey was in world war II where he developed Malaria which gave him the Shakes.....thus the Name Shakey's.....he just move to the Philippines in the early 1980's and is the biggest pizza chain there now.....I Just ate a Shakey's pizza there about 6 months ago...exactly the same as in the '70's but really the sauce is more Grease than sauce....JUST LIKE MAZZIO's.....you know the industry practice is to brush on Bacon Grease ....ON TOP ....to melt the cheese faster.....YUCK>..makes me eat more frozen pizza.....Cholesterol City... Shotgun Sams had real sauce.....and corn meal on the bottom...how ever the business was left the the son and daugther in the late '70's and the remodled and remodeled and run the business in to the ground.

Most of what you say is wrong... I worked at Shotguns 10 years...mazzios is not greasy, and is very similar in quality to mazzios. It was never left to the son/daughter, as Tom&Gay WInslow did not leave the biz to the kids, as they eventually sold it after The Ramond King Sisters raised the rent on the land.

Doug Jones/raymond king were the original owners, and Doug sold a minority chunk to Tom&Gay Winslow who eventulaly became the major owners when Doug sold what was left.Raymong King left his share to his daughters.

Tom&Gay who were the primary owners toward the end, never left the biz to anybody, and it wasnt till Gay Winslow died that Tom went back to Realestate in his last years.

Shotgun Sams was doing well, well into the mid to late 80's. By then though Mazzios/Crystals for a bit, and others were as good as Shotgun sams and it was hurting.Plus Shotguns tried to 'get fancy' which is what hurt the biz most.

They tried to go 'italian deli' at 21st street location.. instead of doing same on 51st location (fancy part of town)... That is what brought them down... not ownership or pizza quality.

It was remodeled a total of 2 times only before it left pizza offerigns for a italian type fancy layout.

Both of the two remodels did not impact the biz negatively and in fact doubled it for years.

It surprises me how people get the facts wrong, but then I actually was there throught there early bigger successes and most of their later successs and failures.

Greetings ya'll I just had to post about the raves I'm getting on my pizza now, THANKS to this forum. I found it purely by accident. Hubs & I have a standing pizza Date on Thursdays when Survivor season is on. I'd usually just buy an expensive frozen one. I've made pizza before but it was always different each time so my search began for a great pizza recipe. That's when I found ya'll. I loved everything about Shakey's and was heart broken when they closed the one here in town. It was hands down my fave place to go for Schlitz Dark beer, pizza, & mojo taters! I attached a pic of my final product. It's a bit out of round, but I fixed that by using a cake cardboard to cut the shape, a few dabs of water on 1/2 inch of the edge, fold over & seal slightly. Voila! Now. not only do I make great pizza, but mojo taters too. I have people begging for the recipe. I love this pizza warmed up as left overs (or cold) I usually make a double recipe so we can have it 2 or 3 days (depending on how hungry we are). Anyhow, I just had to post a pic & say a huge THANKS soo much. I can't even force myself to buy frozen or commercial pizza now. LOL

I was in a pinch for time and tried this recipe today; the pizza went from flour to oven to plate in under an hour. The taste was good, my mouth was searching for flavors that only yeast can provide, but as an emergency unleavened recipe I was very pleased with the result. Its the type of crust that provides great texture and crunch while allowing the toppings to stand out. Thanks for posting the recipe!

I adjusted my ingredients to make a 12" pie with a thickness factor of .07. With a hydration of 40.6% that meant 160g Better for Bread flour, 65g water, and a bit less than the original volumetric measurements for salt and shortening.

I didn't fold the dough, and I don't have a sheeter. But I did roll this thing out with nearly all my weight on the rolling pin I didn't dock the dough and as a result the dough had a lot of rise in the oven, by this I mean the whole dough formed a giant bubble across the entire surface when I did my prebake. I poked and deflated this enormous bubble with a fork prior to adding toppings and finishing the bake, but the bubble is responsible for the layering I experienced.

I strayed from Steve's directions a bit; I baked the dough on a stone in the middle of my electric oven at 550° and used a prebake of about 2 minutes. I didn't use a food processor for the dough-only enough hand-kneading to form a cohesive ball. I let the doughball rest for a few minutes while I prepared the sauce, then flattened it out and let it rest for a few minutes on a peel while I sliced the cheese. I eyeballed the shortening, (Crisco all vegetable) but it was very close to a tablespoon, and the salt was around .5 tsp.

My objective was to make a cracker crust in under an hour rather than focus on making a Shakey's clone (I've never had the pleasure of eating at Shakey's). But with that in mind I was very happy with the resulting texture.